Garbage Burns As Incinerator Is Tested

Looming high above the scrub and pines of a large tract of land near Florida`s Turnpike west of Riviera Beach, a smokestack is silently filling the air with the products of burned garbage.

The company that built the smokestack, the garbage incinerator and the massive $250 million North County Resource Recovery Facility at 45th Street has been burning garbage intermittently for two months.

Within a few weeks, if these test burns of garbage go as planned, the company, Palm Beach Energy Associates, will start a 28-day full-run final test, with garbage burning nonstop.

If the plant works, and if it passes the scrutiny of regulators and company officials, the time will have come for PBEA to turn the plant over to the Palm Beach County Solid Waste Authority and Babcock & Wilcox, the company with the contract to operate the plant.

The deadline to turn the plant over is Dec. 26, and testing is several months ahead of schedule.

What comes out of the 250-foot stack, says PBEA`s Neal Monroe, is ``just hot air,`` the smoke having been neutralized and scrubbed cleaned by state-of-the- art equipment.

The ash from the burned garbage will be trucked to the authority`s adjacent landfill, where officials say it is safely disposed of.

Attorney Joel Daves doubts that.

Daves, one of many local lawyers and residents who unsuccessfully fought putting the project at what is known as Site 7, said he still believes expert testimony given during his court battle.

``This burning is nothing new. It`s just going back to what we used to do, but with filters that don`t work all that well,`` Daves said.

He also said he does not believe the assurances about how liners prevent leachate, or contaminated liquid, from seeping into the ground water.

To make matters worse, he said, Site 7 sits atop the Turnpike Aquifer, a main source of South Florida drinking water.

Other neighbors dismiss the idea that the project poses a health hazard.

Developers of Iron Horse, a subdivision of what are to be homes costing upward of $600,000, are pushing forward. Their property is contiguous with Site 7.

``We obviously believe we know what we`re doing,`` said an Iron Horse spokesman, who requested anonymity.

He said Iron Horse officials investigated the potential negative impact of developing near Site 7 and decided there was nothing to deter them.

Buyers will not be deterred either, he said. Unless the home buyer is ``prejudiced from the beginning, it won`t have a negative impact.``

South county residents might be surprised to hear that kind of money-where- your-mouth-is statement.

The south county residents and some members ofthe Palm Beach County Commission have been fighting the Solid Waste Authority, which wants to put a landfill, trash dump and incinerator at Site 1 west of Boca Raton.

Except for more buffering for homes near Site 1, ``there`s no difference between the two facilities,`` said Marc Bruner of the Solid Waste Authority.